Kim Prisk: Health Hazards of Lunar Dust

National Space Biomedical Research Institute (NSBRI) scientist, G. Kim Prisk, PhD, DSc, explains the health hazards of lunar dust. Apollo astronauts, walking on the Moon's surface, quickly became covered with a fine blackish powder. Like beach sand on Earth, it got into everything.

But what is lunar dust? Why is it a problem for lunar explorers? What are the possible health effects of inhaling lunar dust? How will astronauts, returning to the Moon and later, exploring Mars, solve the dust problem?

Short Version

Long Version

Lessons

Grades 3-5

Making Regolith
In this classroom activity developed for NASA's KSNNTM 21st Century Explorer Newsbreak ("What should you find on the moon's surface?"), students make simulated regolith (lunar dust) and observe its properties.

Dust Catchers
Students build take-home dust catchers with wax paper and petroleum jelly. After a set monitoring period, the dust catchers are brought back to school and representative particle counts are made using a comparison grid.

Grades 5-8

Exploring the Moon
Students compare the process of regolith formation on Earth and the Moon in this activity, excerpted from NASA's Exploring the Moon, a Teacher's Guide (EG-1997-10-116-HQ), with emphasis on Earth and space sciences.

Additional Activities/Extensions

Investigate the effects of static charges on dust particles using a static electricity device (Van de Graff generator).

Compare the accumulation of lunar dust on astronaut space suits to the dust that accumulates on the screens of tube type monitors.

Have student teams come up with proposals for a dust mitigation system on the Moon that will permit astronauts to go outside their base on Moonwalks but not track the dust back inside the base.

Have students investigate the effects of other kinds of dust on human respiratory health. Examples include household dust, coal dust and asbestos.

Additional Resources

Kids' Air
Website focused on air pollution and children's health maintained by the Environmental Protection Agency and other US government agencies.

Lunar Dust Buster
Article by Science@NASA on the lunar dust problem and the possible use of electromagnetic levitation to remove dust from flat surfaces, such as solar panels, while on the Moon and Mars.

Moon Fountains
A science fiction story, written in 1956, which suggested that lunar dust might levitate off the lunar surface due to electrostatic charges. Lunar scientists believe that the story could be credible and that electromagnetic charges could explain why orbiting Apollo 17 astronauts saw "twilight rays" just before and after sunrise and sunset.